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November 11, 2012
The apostasy of an Apple fanboy: Time to begin moving to a new place
There are cracks in Apple's façade, the result of faint subsurface ripples in the substructure that do not bode well for the company in the years to come, as Jobs' legacy products gradually make their way into the world next year and 2014 and then disappear, leaving the denizens of One Infinite Loop to their own devices, as it were.
To that end, thinking like an anesthesiologist as I tend to do, I've begun buying and using the products of other companies so that I'm not hung out to dry without an alternative.
Amazon's Kindle Fire HD and Paperwhite are abominable, true debacles masquerading as successes.
Fanboys know better.
Google Chrome on my new MacBook Pro with Retina Display has been a revelation — much better than my default Camino and leagues ahead of Safari.
Thus, it seems to me that with Google's new Chromebook soon to be available in a 3G version natively running Chrome, it might just be an interesting alternative to Apple's platform.
Both the Air and my new MacBook Pro have one fatal flaw: neither will work with my Virgin Mobile Broadband-To-Go flash stick — unlike my 2004 PowerBook G4 which, with its native 32-bit kernel, plays just fine with BB2Go.
Thus, if you're out of WiFi range, you've got a beautiful and expensive paperweight.
The Chromebook with integrated 3G will obviate the need for the BB2Go ($50/month with no contract) and likely be a whole lot snappier than the almost unbearably slow 2004 machine running it.
The final straw is that it has become apparent that TypePad, my blog host, will never, ever create an iPad app that is anything more than a bare bones placeholder allowing little functionality.
For $329.99 I think the Chromebook is worth a flyer and I'm taking one.
A nice surprise: The ports are in back,
where I think they should be on all laptops.
November 11, 2012 at 09:31 PM | Permalink
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Comments
Can't fool me: you're eating smoked Turkey.
Posted by: 6.02*10^23 | Nov 13, 2012 11:14:47 AM
"I would welcome a laptop with a single bus connection port and skip everything else."
Sigh.
It is good that every now and then us TechnoDolts®™© are reminded by comments such as that from which the quote above is excerpted that we live in a very different world, one in which a bus is something you wait for forever until it finally arrives and you step on board — something I did with pleasure for 10 years or so when I lived in L.A. without a car until finally, faced with the geographical and temporal demands and constraints of working as a locum tenens G.P. and family doctor in the greater L.A. basin, it became clear I simply had to have a car if I were to be able to physically appear at the time and place I was being paid to appear at.
Thus, in 1976 I bought my first car, the beloved $500 Thrasher — a 1969 white Buick Skylark convertible about the size of an aircraft carrier, about which I have waxed lovingly here in the past and will no doubt someday do again.
But not now.
No, this is simply a shout-out to those of us who haven't the faintest idea what techiespeak about buses and I/O levels is all about — we just want to know where the on/off switch is so we can do the electronic equivalent of unplugging our devices and then plug them back in, something we do on a daily basis.
Always have, always will.
We don't try to figure stuff out or make things that don't work work: we move on.
You might even say that most of us — even those who pass gas for free instead of making a living doing so — "Think Like An Anesthesiologist" in that respect.
Hey, wait a sec — that sounds like it might make an interesting book.
But I digress.
No, you guys go on telling us all about your electronic dreams, we'll sit back here eating peanuts and laughing at the crazy talk.
As Flautist says, "It's a hoot!"
Posted by: bookofjoe | Nov 13, 2012 6:07:59 AM
I would welcome a laptop with a single bus connection port and skip everything else. Plug in to a docking station and (depending on the level of I/O that your computing calls for) the size of a pack of gum for HDMI / USB / audio; or, have a full tilt boogie desktop I/O docking station for everything under the sun plus what's new next week. Direct bus access makes older models last longer where I/O can be upgraded with a new dongle.
Posted by: 6.02*10^23 | Nov 12, 2012 1:40:29 AM
I too am looking for web surfing nirvana. I hoped it would come when I upgraded my dell 11z to w8. Alas the Chromebook that arrived 3 days later is my preferred device. It's small, quick enough and has better battery life than the Dell.
It's not perfect by any stretch, but I like it better. I am using the Dell at the moment, whichever device is closest.
The best thing about Chrome is syncing between devices, and I have too many between work, phone and home.
The most annoying thing about w8 is the dual personality interface. If mail is running in the desktop, it doesn't know about chrome in the metro interface, so it launches a new session.
So the pecking order at home is Chromebook, Dell 11, tie Nexus 7/iPad (g1).
Posted by: Greg | Nov 11, 2012 11:18:09 PM
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